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The energy and passion with which Ana Fuchs leads Atlanta Jewish Kids Groups is testament to the commitment of those professionals who are visionary, creative and willing to look outside of pre-determined models of Jewish supplemental education and create a meaningful, joyous educational experience for Jewish kids. I am fortunate to be part of a summer camp experience for kids where I am actually teaching Judaics! During the summer! And the kids love it. Each summer at Ramah Darom, where I am a member of the Judaics staff; the positive associations, the experiential education, the immersion in the totality of a uniquely Jewish experience, creates an environment where Jewish learning is occurring in all the campers do each day. Ana realized the need for after school care and converged it with Jewish learning, and she has created what I am sure will be a positive experience for all participants. Additionally, providing meaningful benefits to her professional staff adds to her recipe for success. Happy and fulfilled staff also make for happy and fulfilled students. Jewish Kids Group offers the complete package for success. We in Atlanta are lucky to have her vision and her fortitude.

This past week, I was incredibly moved at my daughter’s camp Shabbat – where she confidently and comfortably expressed her “Jewish Joy” – this was HER Jewish experience HER community and something that she will remember all of her life. The model that Ana Fuchs presents in this piece, with a daily immersion into a connected community of happy jews, creative educators who are inspired and invested and a Jewish experience that is all their own is the first supplemental model I’ve heard of that seems to have the potential to have the same, if not greater level of impact. This model also does something critical for the continuation of vibrant Jewish life – it meets already exisiting needs of working families WHILE providing something unique and high quality. This isn’t an add on, it’s an invterwoven component of Jewish life that will no doubt have a huge impact on the lucky families involved, the Jewish communal field and most importantly, the “jewish kids” in the groups. Thank you Ana for this piece and for inspiring us all with Jewish Kids Groups

I love Kesher and certainly borrowed their best practices in professional development and creating a community of educators for JKG. However, children only go to Kesher 2 days a week, not five like the programs I referenced. I believe Kesher started out as a five day program and switched over to two days fairly recently.

Like Dan, my initial thought was that this sounds a lot like Kesher (profiled under a pseudonym in Jack Wertheimer’s book on supplementary schools). But a logistical question: how do the kids of these working parents get from school to supplementary school every day?

Mira, I think transportation details vary by program, but for MoEd in Montgomery County, MD, many schools in our area bus children. We are able to work with Montgomery County public schools and some private schools to have the existing busses drop children off at the program location. The county school system is already used to dropping kids off at various aftercare programs in our area.

FYI our children have been attending Chabad’s afterschool program in Florida for the past 4 years. It’s a daily program that in addition to Hebrew includes Art, Ceramics, Martial Arts, Drama and so much more. They also offer help with homework, tutoring and everything we could have asked for… and then some! We are so blessed to have a program like that in our community and wish they would duplicate it the world over. I thank them for it every day and if there is anyone out there looking to do something like that, I think they have the right model. Their website is http://www.HebrewSchool.info

Just for the record, Kesher kids attend 2,3, or 4 times a week. We did at one stage offer a fifth, but the need to close early for our northerly Boston shabbat meant that it didn’t really work so well for most parents. Meeting parents real afterschool care needs is critical to the success of these programs – hence the need to offer multiple days.

The chiddush in our model, and in many of the ‘new wave’ is not frequency of attendance, it is, on the one hand, successfully leveraging an afterschool model to create a _meaningful community_ in which learning can occur, and on the other, meeting families childcare needs. Meet those needs, and families are willing to devote a significant chunk of their kids time (eg 3-4 hrs after school). That time enables the meaningful community to be built. There is plenty more to getting it right, and the structure needs to be accompanied by appropriate pedagogies, curriculum, etc . It does not, however, need kids to attend 5 days a week.

Here’s to the transformative power of afterschool Jewish learning communities, however many days the kids go!

Thank you for your comment Rafi. I was under the incorrect understanding that children attended Kesher Newton only up to 2 days a week. Please forgive me, KESHER CERTAINLY IS THE LEADER, the prototype, in week-long Jewish after school education. When I visited last year I was left speechless at the level of learning, the practice of meaningful Hebrew immersion, the depth of community, the sincerity of the team and children. You are an inspiration to JKG and I think all multi-day programs.

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